CHESTER, Pa. — Situated in the shadow of the Commodore Barry Bridge, Subaru Park served as a fitting location for the Chaos’ performance in the Premier Lacrosse League semifinals on Sunday.
Transition was the order of the afternoon. The sixth-seeded Chaos used it again and again and again to fuel a 15-9 upset over the second-seeded Atlas and advance to the PLL championship game for the second year in a row. The Chaos erased an 8-5 halftime deficit and ran away via a 9-0 run that turned the second half into one-way traffic.
“I was seeing open long poles,” goalie Blaze Riorden said of his instantaneous outlets that sparked many of the Chaos’ transition opportunities.
Riorden made 17 saves (68 percent), and like the MVP finalist usually does, he made the spectacular look routine. He had 10 saves in the second half alone. Dhane Smith led the way on the stat sheet with six points on three goals and three assists. His roommate and fellow Buffalo Bandit, Josh Byrne, wasn’t far behind with four goals and one assist.
“We’re just gonna keep playing Chaos ball,” Byrne said on the NBCSN broadcast after his second goal — a twister shot in transition.
That meant fast and physical.
The Chaos’ defense held the Atlas’ offense scoreless for nearly 21 minutes. Jeff Teat finally ended the scoring drought with 5:01 remaining in the fourth quarter.
Teat, a finalist for MVP, Attackman of the Year and Rookie of the Year, had eight points in a 16-10 win over the Chaos earlier this summer. This afternoon, he was marked by Jack Rowlett, who missed the previous matchup while recovering from a broken nose he sustained in a win over the Cannons.
Teat managed one assist and two goals. Both were in unsettled situations.
“It’d be a heck of matchup,” Rowlett, a Defenseman of the Year Finalist for the second season in a row, said last week regarding the opportunity to guard Teat for the first time since the U19 FIL World Championship in 2016.
“I think our defense is getting better every week,” Chaos head coach Andy Towers said. “I think we’re really dictating the tempo going the other way.”
The Chaos triple-poled the Atlas’ vaunted midfield, electing to put short-sticks on Jake Carraway and Eric Law for much of the game. After trailing 4-1 after the first quarter, the Atlas took their first lead of the game with eight minutes remaining in the second quarter on a diving attempt by Law in which he split two defenders. Bryan Costabile scored a two-point goal less than a minute later to punctuate the Atlas’ seven-point second quarter that put them ahead 8-5.
The second half began the same way the first started, with a pole goal from the Chaos. Long-stick midfielders Troy Reh and CJ Costabile each found the back of the net for two-pointers. The frenetic pace and poles presence in the offensive end brought back shades of the 2019 regular season, when the Chaos claimed the No. 1 seed with a fast-paced style and their much publicized “Bomb Squad” of poles who scored two-point goals.
“It’s a product of them giving me shots I want to see,” Riorden said of the team’s tempo and one of the reasons he leads the league in clean saves.
This season, the Chaos stumbled to an 0-3 start but rebounded finish the regular season 4-5. Two weeks after topping the third-seeded Archers and holding the most efficient offense in the league to 10 goals, the Chaos lived up to their name and again stunned a higher seeded team. Max Adler went 10-for-22 at the faceoff stripe but earned Towers’ praise because he prevented Trevor Baptiste from winning draws clean and sparking transition.
“We’ve got an unbelievably tight locker room and these guys are genuinely playing for each other ... That’s when guys become really dangerous,” Towers said.
When the final whistle sounded, the Chaos’ transition wasn’t done just yet. The entire team raced to get their goalie.
“I think the best is yet to come,” Riorden said of his squad that’s now one step closer to its first PLL title.